


The First Desire

by letmetellyouaboutmyfeels



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Originally Posted on Tumblr, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-19
Updated: 2020-03-19
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:55:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 522
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23218129
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/letmetellyouaboutmyfeels/pseuds/letmetellyouaboutmyfeels
Summary: Phryne asks Jack a question.
Relationships: Phryne Fisher/Jack Robinson
Comments: 22
Kudos: 116





	The First Desire

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted here: https://letmetellyouaboutmyfeels.tumblr.com/post/613045378141519872/the-first-desire-is-to-feel-that-one-is-desired

“When did you first know?”

“Hmm?” Jack had been half-dozing, but Phryne was evidently more awake than that.

He opened his eyes, blinked, and turned. Phryne’s head was not quite resting on his shoulder, but might as well have been. Her dark hair looked almost liquid in the moonlight.

“Not that I’m particularly romantic,” Phryne went on, and Jack snorted because, well, that was both entirely true and a fantastic lie, “but I am curious, when you first realized how you felt.”

The car accident was when he’d realized just how bad it was, just how dangerous, when he’d known the iron maiden he’d put his heart into. But he’d long before acknowledged his developing feelings.

“When I…”

It was embarrassing to admit. Jack Robinson did not like to think of himself as a jealous man. He had never cared when men had tried to flirt with Rosie, back when they were married. Let them try, he’d known Rosie was loyal.

And he would never want to change Phryne. When he’d realized that he was envious of all the men she slept with, when he’d realized that he was jealous of her time, he’d been ashamed. He would never ask Phryne to change who she was. Then she wouldn’t be Phryne anymore. But it had eaten at him.

“I realized,” Jack forced himself to go on, “that I didn’t want you to want me. I wanted you to want me more than anyone else. I wanted you to prefer me.”

Phryne made a small noise. She didn’t say anything, not for a moment, at least, but her hand closed over his in the dark, under the bed covers.

She had known he was a ‘one and done’ sort of man, just as he’d known she was a ‘sample everything on the buffet table’ kind of woman. There was nothing wrong with either. But never the twain shall meet.

And yet. Somehow.

He didn’t think she would say anything more, and there was nothing for him to say. What could there be, that wouldn’t sound like boasting? He was the one living with Phryne, he was the only one in her bed the past six months and counting. To dwell on it would put him in danger of making her sound like a prize, and Phryne Fisher was not something to be won, not by anyone. If anything, she was the collector, building an odd little family for herself out of the forgotten and overlooked.

Besides, her fingers were still intertwined with his, and that was answer enough.

But then, she did speak.

“I wanted to be preferred.” Phryne sounded half amused, half frustrated with herself. “I didn’t realize how much until Rosie. And it occurred to me that it wouldn’t be such a bad thing, to have only one person. If the person in question was interesting enough. And understood me well enough.”

He turned his face, his nose finding her hair. She smelled like jasmine.

Phryne’s thumb swept back and forth over the curve of his hand. Jack thought, in the cotton-soft moments just before sleep, that it matched his heartbeat.


End file.
